Digital collections are a sprint, not a Marathon: Adapting scrum project management techniques to library digital initiatives

Abstract

This article describes a case study in which a small team from the digital initiatives group and metadata services department at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU-Boulder) Libraries conducted a pilot of the Scrum project management framework. The pilot team organized digital initiatives work into short, fixed intervals called sprints-a key component of Scrum. Working for more than a year in the modified framework yielded significant improvements to digital collection work, including increased production of digital objects and surrogate records, accelerated publication of digital collections, and an increase in the number of concurrent projects. Adoption of sprints has improved communication and cooperation between participants, reinforced teamwork, and enhanced their ability to adapt to shifting priorities.